The Bauhaus Exhibition of 1923
The weeks in which the Bauhaus put itself in front of the public for the first time, in three buildings and one house it had to build first.
From 15 August to 30 September 1923 the Bauhaus showed the public what its teaching had produced — and had to build one of the venues first.
Three buildings and a house that did not exist yet
The exhibition took three sites in the city: the building that is the Museum Neues Weimar today, and the school's two van de Velde buildings, the main building and the workshop building.[1] The fourth address had to be built from nothing — the Haus Am Horn, a ready-to-live-in family house put up in four months at Am Horn, which is a considerable thing to attempt when the point of the exercise is to be judged.
Who made it
Georg Muche led the exhibition and designed the house;[2] Walter Gropius's building office put it up. Oskar Schlemmer's reliefs and stairwell mural, made for these weeks, were among the artistic high points, and they did not last: the university records that they fell victim to the "purge" of 1930.
The argument on display
The point of the whole apparatus was that architecture, furniture, design and colour are one question. Here, for the first time, the school's answer was assembled in one place rather than asserted in a manifesto[1] — and anyone who had opinions about the Bauhaus could walk through it, open a cupboard and disagree.
Sources
- 1923–2023: Bauhaus-Ausstellung 1923 — Bauhaus-Universität Weimar, retrieved 29 August 2026
- Georg Muche — Bauhaus Kooperation, retrieved 29 August 2026
Historical figures
Historical figures
1881–1929 • architect • master of architecture at the Bauhaus • teacher
The house at the centre of the exhibition was built under his direction.
1899–1944 • designer • cabinetmaker • toy designer
Her children's room was part of the model house the exhibition was built around.
1895–1987 • painter • Bauhaus master • head of the weaving workshop
He led it, and designed the house that was its centrepiece.
1888–1943 • painter • sculptor • choreographer • Bauhaus master
His wall works for the workshop building were among its artistic highlights.
1883–1969 • architect • founder and director of the Bauhaus • teacher
He staged it, as director of the school.
Historic sites
Historic sites
Geschwister-Scholl-Straße 8, 99423 Weimar
Two of the three city venues were the school's own van de Velde buildings.
Jorge-Semprún-Platz 5, 99423 Weimar
The third city venue: the building that houses the Museum Neues Weimar today.
Period
In Weimar's history
In Weimar's history
An election, a halved budget, and contracts cancelled to 31 March 1925: the school left for Dessau after six years.
The exhibition made the school visible; the reaction that closed it here followed.
Five years after the Bauhaus left, what it had painted on the walls of its workshop building was destroyed — by the school that took its place.
The wall works destroyed here were made for that exhibition, seven years earlier.